Blind Boxes
by knives4cash
Summary: How many should you collect?


It all started off so simply. Sure, I was running for my life, the cops were shooting at me, my aura was dangerously low, and I'd been backed into a corner, but life was simple then. Live or die. What could have been an easier choice to make? I was about to surrender to them when she came into my life and made things complicated.

She was beautiful. Deadly. She had this short, curled hair that was as black as night, with a very fashionable red dress that hugged her curves very nicely. She also wore heels, which was kind of odd for fighting the corrupt system, but I wasn't one to judge. She engaged the two officers in a quick duel with her fancy swords and defeated them as swiftly as she moved, like a hawk diving in for a meal.

They were stunned, dazed. The beautiful lady then pulled out this nasty bug, and it slapped onto their faces, sucking the life out of them. She offered me a better life, and so I followed her home, like a lovestruck puppy on a leash.

She told me what she wanted to tell me about her life, her motives, whatever she wanted. I listened. I never wanted to leave her side, even when the rest of the gang started to complain about how she suddenly had a massive boner for authority and order in her gang. She also released a list of hairstyles that people could have, but mine was already one of them, and She had decided to grow Hers out. I didn't have to get used to a change like they did, so I didn't mind.

Then, we found Mercury while we were trying to recruit his dad. He had set the house on fire, which was a total waste. His mom came running out, crying about how horrible the situation was, yadda-yadda. I looked to my leader for guidance, and she drove a burnt tree branch through the lady's stomach, prompting the woman to fall to her knees. I was going to ask my leader why She used such a contrived method, but She then pulled out that bug thing again and stuck it to the lady's face, sucking the life out of her.

We went back to base with our new recruit, and She could plainly see how disturbed Mercury was. She felt obligated to bake the poor guy an apple pie. She claimed it was so that he'd eat something, as he was grieving, but we all thought it was kinda odd. She let me have some of Her pie, though, and I happily ate.

Life went on as usual, but She was a bit more loving about things, as she claimed to have realized that we all needed a more motherly leader.

Then we tracked down this maiden lady. Something about power and kingdoms and a headmaster. I used my semblance to distract her, but she caught wind of it, and we all had this epic battle, but she was defeated by Her. She pulled out the bug again, but before she could completely drain the girl, this dude with a sword came swooping in like a sparrow and saved the day. We had to fall back.

She didn't take the setback too well. She started bundling up more and setting the secret base's AC to these really chilly temperatures. Not cold cold, just uncomfortably chill cold. We planned our next move accordingly, but they had to involve horses. It was kind of odd, but she suddenly felt that horses were a great means of transportation in the wilderness settlement zones, and so she had to ride a horse every time she journeyed about. Kind of odd, but it was a natural evolution of the gang's infrastructure.

She gave up a perfectly good motorcycle. I was sad to see it go.

We continued on with the plan: Infiltrate Beacon and search out students. Pyrrha Nikos was the prime candidate. The tournament came, and we did our thing: cause global panic and chaos by unleashing a Grimm invasion on one kingdom, destabilizing the other three economically and socially, while militarily incapacitating the original one.

Then we confronted the headmaster, who had an epic duel with Her. She won, but he managed to escape. Everyone thought he was dead for two whole episodes. She was really ticked about that. Every now and then, when Merc and I thought she was over it, she'd murmur something about "Time Dilation" powers, or "Seeing Past And Future," or something of the sort.

After the headmaster escaped, Pyrrha confronted Her, which was a total one-eighty turn for her, as a character. I'd been studying her for about a year, and she always came off as smart, calculated, logical, and while she was human about her emotions she always thought before she acted. Then, this one time, she just did a really stupid thing when she had clearly seen what was going on.

Anyways, she lost, we held her by the arms, the bug thing came out again, and She absorbed the girl's life.

This one annoying girl got there just in time to see us finish the job, and she did this overly dramatic scream of "No!", even though she and Pyrrha had never even shared one moment together. Like, why am I supposed to think that's genuine? Anyways, she somehow felt really torn up about Pyrrha's death, and she unleashed this epic Wings-From-Eyeballs super power that did a white-out for all of us.

I remember the moment vividly. I came out of consciousness, groggy and dazed. As the world had begun to fade back into existence for me, I felt the warm embrace of satin sheets. I realized that I was back home, with Her. In our base, safe and sound, I smelled warm apple pie. Sitting up from my bed, I looked to the doorway where She stood. She greeted me with a smile. An actual smile! She had apple pie on a plate for me, and as She walked into my room, She had on this really contrived push up bra added to Her outfit.

She sat down at my beside, offering me the piece of pie that was clearly made with me in mind. She knew I liked brown sugar on my pie crust, and She had daintily sprinkled some on the warm, steaming, crusty top.

I was still kind of dazed, so I called out to Her, gently. I called Her by name. With a warm smile, she nodded and spoke with cheer.

"Hello again!"

I don't know why, but after that, She was different. She wasn't just motherly-kind to us, She was creepy-kind. To the whole gang. If even the newest, greenest recruit looking to become an elite terrorist wasn't doing so well in the field, She'd take time out of Her day to personally coach them on how to use a rifle, pick out ideal targets in crowds, detonate bombs in the densest population zones in malls, all that stuff. She even had these wishy-washy, wanna-be romances with some of the dumbest, stupidest guys entering our gang.

We went after Ruby Rose, the girl who screwed us over at Beacon. We separated her from her team and had to fight for our lives against her ferocious might. It was a hard slog, with defeat swinging back and forth for all of us. Finally, though, She managed to slice off the girl's right arm, ending the battle in blood as red as her hair.

I held Ruby down by the legs. Mercury clamped down on her left arm. Our leader approached. The bug came out once more, and the deed was done yet again. We left her where she had fallen and retired to our base, exhausted but content.

Strangely, the day after our battle, I awoke to find Her racing all over the place, peppy and happy about Her most recent conquest obviously, but more importantly: She wanted to make the world a better place, She claimed. We were all stunned, but She was even more inspirational than usual, and we all just kinda sorta went along with it, initially.

She also insisted on wearing the dead girl's cape, so I went back and took it. I was going to wash it, as it had turned all crusty, but She was fine with the way it was.

Some of us were mad at the new, benevolent agenda, and we as a giant gang fragmented a bit. A splinter group was formed, and we had a bit of a civil war. Adam Taurus led the internal rebellion, and when we finally crushed him, he fled to his ex-girlfriend. I had the opportunity to go with Adam, who had drawn Mercury into his broody folds. I chose to stay with the woman who had given me everything I could have ever wanted. It tore me apart when I had to kill Mercury.

I had originally wanted revenge on the world, but She had taken me in, given me a home. I was ultimately happy to stay with Her, regardless of Her agenda, but it just felt wrong to be trying to help the world that had hurt me so badly. We didn't really have a lot of time to discuss the morality behind it all, because Adam returned with a coalition force of his splinter group, Atlesian mechs, and Valenite Rifle Troopers. We had a few big, epic battles, some victories and others defeats. When Adam had finally been cornered, She finished him off Herself, though they had one last conversation before the end.

He had clung to Her hand and pushed it against his skull and begged Her to "make him a part of it all," and She told him that he "simply wasn't worth the space," so She materialized a knife and stuck it in his throat instead.

Shortly thereafter, we cornered Blake Belladonna, who chose to fall on her own sword, rather than go back to the Fang. It was at that moment that I realized we were the bad guys. No one ever regrets joining the army that much. I mean, I knew we had a lot of blood on our hands, but I thought we were going to make the world right. In the end, I guess She just wanted to make the world Her own way, though "Her way" really changed depending on whom She had just killed.

She actually went pale when She saw the Blake girl kill herself. Something inside Her just kind of snapped, and She made a vow to bring rightness to the world, and She insisted I come along with Her to see it through. "Cookies are sweet, but the road to redemption is sweeter," She told me.

We didn't really have time to set this redemption in motion, as the remnants of resistance made a last ditch effort to confront us. It was a contingent of mostly raw recruits, led by two huntresses my age. Weiss Schnee and Yang Xiao Long, apparently the last two girls in the team of the long-dead Ruby Rose.

Instead of cutting them to pieces immediately, She tried to convince them to work with Her, to "be part of something greater," but Her pleas fell on deaf ears, and we had to fight one last time. Yang declared she'd have her vengeance for her sister, but when I managed to cripple Weiss' leg, the fight decisively swung in our favor, and our troops cut theirs to pieces.

Yang, at the end of her rope, fell to her knees and confessed that she didn't care about the Faunus's rights, or the preservation of Vale, or the moral debates on safety versus freedom. She just wanted her sister back, and that she knew she wasn't going to get her back.

I was so, so happy for Her when She stayed true to Her promise of redemption. She promised that She'd rebuild the world for Ruby, that no blood would ever again be shed.

Weiss didn't buy it, and she blew up her dust supply in an attempt to kill Her.

When the smoke cleared, and the ringing dissipated, I saw two heart-broken women. Farther away, I had suffered minor wounds from the blast, but She had taken a lot of it right to the face. Yang hadn't fared much better, though she was definitely handling it a lot better.

Despite the bloody coughs, she declared that Weiss always got her way, and that Ruby would be avenged, that she'd told her a long time ago that she had wanted to be "a normal girl with normal knees," but that she ended up getting the "Schnee's knees".

I still hate puns.

The love of my life didn't have much to say to that. I tried to help Her up, but Her body was clearly beyond the point of saving. I tried to get Her to give a will and testimony, to ensure that the Fang survived, but I was already in tears at that point and could barely fumble with some pathetic goodbyes and confessions of feelings.

I knew She had never even felt a mutual respect for me, but I tried to comfort Her in Her last moments. She could have said anything, but She chose to pull summon that creepy bug one last time. She spoke her last words, and I think it was the only time She ever begged.

"Be with your sister, Yang."


End file.
